The Subtle Knife Part II of
His Dark Materials Trilogy -
by Philip Pullman

Brand New 8 CDs 8.9 Hours - Performed by the
Author along with a full cast

The Subtle Knife is the 2nd piece of the trilogy that started with The Golden Compass. That initial book was set in a planet like ours, but different. This book starts in our own planet.

In The Subtle Knife, visitors are introduced to Will Parry, a young boy living in modern Oxford, England. Will is just twelve years older, but he bears the duties of an adult. After the disappearance of his explorer-father, John Parry, during an journey in the North, Will became parent, provider and protector to his frail, confused mom. And it's in safeguarding her that he becomes a murderer, too: he accidentally eliminates a guy who breaks into their house to take useful letters created by John Parry. After placing his mom in the care of the type friend, Will takes those letters and sets off to discover the truth about his dad.

Will does indeed create an astonishing discovery, but it's not about his dad. Along a busy road, he occurs upon an extraordinary window in the air. Almost invisible to the eye, it opens into an completely different planet. Anxious to stay hidden, Will ventures through this window into the shimmering, haunted city of Cittàgazze, where he meets Lyra Belacqua and her dæmon, Pantalaimon, who have moreover wandered into Cittàgazze from another planet while looking for the answers behind Dust. Aside from Will and his modern companions, this city is eerie, clear and quiet. The persons have fled to the mountains to escape the Specters, phantom-like beings that feed found on the consciousness of grown-ups, exiting them zombie-like and void forever after. Just the kids, that are secure within the Specters, venture out to scavenge for food.

Although secure in Cittàgazze, the 2 pass through the window to Will's Oxford understanding that answers to their issues lie therein. Will inquires about his father's journey to the North and learns that it included a research of atmospheric particles. And meanwhile, Lyra seeks out a scholar who could tell her much more about Dust. The scholar Lyra finds is a certain scientist called Dr. Mary Malone, a member of the Dark Matter Research Unit, who has noticed the existence of Shadows, the same mysterious entity as the Dust of Lyra's planet. But more startling is the fact that Mary Malone has found that in these Shadows, or Dark Matter, or Dust, there is consciousness. These particles are aware, and their awareness is what powers Lyra's alethiometer, and what surrounds all human thought and matter. Mary Malone's upcoming task is to locate a method to communicate with these particles, for they may tell her about the vital part she plays in the fate of the universe.

When Lyra and Will return to Cittàgazze, Will reads the letters his dad wrote during his final journey in the North, and he learns that his dad knew about the windows between worlds. His dad planned to travel through a window to explore another planet - simply as Will had performed himself. For Will, this was finally anything both dad and son might share, but more importantly, it meant that his dad may be alive. Had he ventured through that window, John Parry can be worlds away, but someplace he was alive. And Will resolves to locate him.

Lyra, meanwhile, pays a 2nd see to Dr. Mary Malone, and this time there are authorities waiting to question Lyra about her interest in Shadow particles and Dark Matter. She inadvertently reveals her participation with Will, instantly flees the lab, and runs directly into Sir Charles Latrom, a deceiving guy who has watched Lyra function the alethiometer and realizes its value. Flustered by her escape within the lab, Lyra discovers too late that Sir Charles has stolen her alethiometer. When Will and Lyra try to receive it back, they discover its ransom: a certain knife situated in the significant tower of Cittàgazze.

The 2 young neighbors enter the tower together and climb to the truly top, where Will faces a ferocious fight for the knife. Will eventually triumphs, creating him the rightful bearer of the knife. This really is the Subtle Knife, and it happens to be an object of extraordinary and devastating force. There is nothing sharper or even more lethal, as well as its bearer is capable of cutting entries into countless additional worlds. Armed with all the subtle knife, Will and Lyra retrieve her alethiometer by outsmarting Sir Charles, who they discover has been conspiring with Lyra's own mom, Mrs. Coulter. With knife and alethiometer in hand, Will and Lyra return to Cittàgazze to cv the look for Will's dad.

In the meantime, Lyra's aged friend, Lee Scoresby, the Texan aeronaut, has found a certain explorer, Stanislaus Grumman, a guy with a famous following. Grumman was a famous explorer within the far North immersed in researching Dust. He is rumored to have the many unusual osprey daemon, and it was mentioned that he when refused the love of the witch. Then a shaman, his tribal Tartar name is Jopari, a.k.a. John Parry. He is Will's own dad. While on his last journey, John Parry stumbled through a window into another globe. He found himself in the globe of Specters, witnessed their horror, and fled into another planet. Unable to obtain his method back to the window that led to house, he adopted the persona of Stanislaus Grumman and endeavored to discover everything he may about this Dust as well as its impact found on the universe. Most importantly, Grumman learned of the subtle knife and the important part its bearer plays in the fate of the whole universe. Grumman's task, with Lee Scoresby, is to locate the bearer of the subtle knife and inform him of the road that lies ahead.

What neither Will nor Grumman realizes is the fact that this ultimate meeting is not between knife bearer and shaman, but quite between dad and son. High on a mountaintop in the total blackness of the evening, Will encounters Grumman who informs Will that he, with his knife, stands in the balance amongst the forces of Great and Evil and that his fate lies in finding Lord Asriel. Curious to find this knife bearer's face, Grumman lights a match and when of light is enough for each to understand whom he is facing. In the upcoming instant, Will's dad is killed by the scorned witch, aim on revenge, and again, Will loses the dad he's not recognized.

Will climbs down within the mountain to return to Lyra, but rather finds 2 angels awaiting him. Lyra is gone; her alethiometer remains behind. Clearly, she has been removed against her may. Friendless, fatherless and confused, Will has another journey before him, a journey that usually finally fulfill his fate and present the secret of Dust.

About the Author Philip PullmanPhilip Pullman CBE (born October 19, 1946) is an English author. He is the
best-selling writer of His Dark Materials, a trilogy of fantasy novels, along with a
amount of different books.

Biography

Pullman was born in Norwich, Norfolk, England, to RAF pilot Alfred Outram and
Audrey Evelyn Merrifield. The family travelled with his father's job, including
to Southern Rhodesia (today Zimbabwe), where he invested time at school. His dad
was killed in a airplane crash in 1953 when Pullman was 7. His mom
remarried and with a move to Australia came Pullman's discovery of comic books
including Superman and Batman, a medium which he continues to espouse. From
1957 he was educated at Ysgol Ardudwy school in Harlech, Gwynedd and invested time
in Norfolk with his grandfather, a clergyman. Around this time Pullman
noticed John Milton's Paradise Lost, which would become a main influence
for His Dark Materials.

From 1963 Pullman attended Exeter College, Oxford, getting a Third class BA
in 1968, in an interview with all the Oxford Student he reported that "he didn't
love the English course" and that "I thought I was doing very effectively
until I came out with my 3rd class degree and then I realised that I wasn’t —
it was the year they stopped providing 4th class degrees otherwise I’d have
1 of those". He noticed William Blake's illustrations around 1970, which
would furthermore later influence him greatly

Pullman wedded Judith Speller in 1970 and started training youngsters and composing
school plays. His initial published function was The Haunted Storm, which joint-won
the New English Library's Young Writer's Award in 1972. He nevertheless refuses
to discuss it. Galatea, an adult fantasy-fiction novel, followed in 1978, but
it was his school plays which inspired his initial children's book, Count
Karlstein, in 1982. He stopped training around the publication of The Ruby in
the Smoke (1986), his 2nd children's book, whose Victorian setting is
indicative of Pullman's interest in that era.

Pullman taught part-time at Westminster College, Oxford between 1988 and 1996,
continuing to write children's stories. He started His Dark Materials about 1993.
Northern Lights (published as The Golden Compass in the US) was published in
1996 and won the Carnegie Medal, the most prestigious British children's
fiction awards, and the Guardian Children's Fiction Award.

Pullman has been composing full-time since 1996, but continues to deliver talks
and writes sometimes for The Guardian. He was granted a CBE in the New
Year's Honours list in 2004. Pullman furthermore started lecturing at a seminar in
English at his alma mater, Exeter College, Oxford, in 2004. He is currently
functioning on The Book of Dust, a sequel to his completed His Dark Materials
trilogy.

His Dark Materials

His Dark Materials consists of Northern Lights (titled The Golden Compass in
North America), The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass (see equally a brief
companion piece, Lyra's Oxford, containing products of interest along with a brief story,
in addition to the yet-unpublished prequel, The Book of Dust ).

The initially amount of the trilogy, Northern Lights, won the Carnegie Medal for
children's fiction in the UK in 1995. The Amber Spyglass, the last amount, was
granted both 2001 Whitbread Prize for ideal children's book and the Whitbread
Book of the Year prize in January 2002, the initially children's book to obtain
that honor. The trilogy won favored acclaim in late 2003, taking 3rd region in
the BBC's Big Read poll.

In 2005 Pullman was announced as joint winner of the Astrid Lindgren Memorial
Award for children's literature.

Philosophical and religious perspective

Pullman is a Distinguished Supporter of the British Humanist Association and an
Honorary Associate of the National Secular Society.

The His Dark Materials books have been at the heart of controversy, particularly
with certain Christian groups. Some, including Peter Hitchens, claim that he
actively pursues an anti-Christian agenda. Proponents of the view quote the
important articles he has created regarding C. S. Lewis' series The Chronicles
of Narnia (which Pullman denounces as religious propaganda), and the generally
bad portrayal of the "Church" in His Dark Materials.

The 2 series have some resemblance. Both feature kids facing adult moral
options, chatting animals, religious allegories, parallel worlds, and concern
the best fate of those worlds. The initial published Narnia book, The Lion,
the Witch and the Wardrobe, starts with a young girl hiding in a wardrobe, as
does the initial His Dark Materials book, Northern Lights (published as The
Golden Compass in North America).

Some, including Hitchens again, have enjoyed the His Dark Materials series as a
direct rebuttal of C. S. Lewis's series.Pullman has moreover criticised the means
Lewis excludes the character Susan within the final 'heaven' scenes in The Last
Battle, suggesting she is refused for her growing worldliness. Lewis devotees
argue that Pullman has read too deeply into this; Lewis created no statement about
Susan's ultimate destiny, and not excluded the possibility of her rejoining
her neighbors in paradise later, as they are dead and she remains alive.

But, Pullman has found help from alternative Christians, many notably Rowan
Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. These groups and people point out
that Pullman's attacks are focused found on the constraints of dogmatism and the utilization
of religion to oppress, not on Christianity itself. Dr. Williams has gone thus
far as to propose that His Dark Materials be taught as piece of religious
knowledge in universities. Moreover, even authors of functions focused on important
appraisals of religious themes in his writing have described Pullman as a
friendly and good debating partner.

Screen adaptations

* A movie adaptation of The Butterfly Tattoo is set to movie in 2007. It is
a Philip Pullman supported project to let young artists a chance to receive movie
industry experience.
* A co-produced BBC and WGBH Boston tv adaptation of The Ruby in the
Smoke, starring Billie Piper and Julie Walters, was screened in the UK on BBC
One on 27 December 2006 and premiered on PBS Masterpiece Theatre in America on
February 4, 2007. The BBC and WGBH have plans to adjust the additional 3 Sally
Lockhart novels, The Shadow in the North, The Tiger in the Well, and The Tin
Princess, for tv.
* A movie adaptation, titled His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass, is to be
introduced in December 2007 by New Line Cinema, starring Nicole Kidman, Daniel
Craig and Dakota Blue Richards.

Bibliography

Non-series books

* 1972 The Haunted Storm
* 1976 Galatea
* 1982 Count Karlstein
* 1987 How to be Cool
* 1989 Spring-Heeled Jack
* 1990 The Broken Bridge
* 1992 The White Mercedes
* 1993 The Wonderful Story of Aladdin and the Enchanted Lamp
* 1995 Clockwork, or, All Wound Up
* 1995 The Firework-Maker's Daughter
* 1998 Mossycoat
* 1998 The Butterfly Tattoo (re-issue of The White Mercedes)
* 1999 I was a Rat! or The Scarlet Slippers
* 2000 Puss in Boots: The Adventures of That Many Enterprising Feline
* 2004 The Scarecrow and his Servant

The New-Cut Gang

* 1994 Thunderbolt's Waxwork
* 1995 The Gasfitter's Ball

Sally Lockhart

* 1985 The Ruby in the Smoke
* 1986 The Shadow in the North (initial published as The Shadow in the Plate)
* 1990 The Tiger in the Well
* 1994 The Tin Princess

The Subtle Knife Part II of
His Dark Materials Trilogy -
by Philip Pullman

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